


Respite

by Fierceawakening



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-25
Updated: 2019-08-25
Packaged: 2020-09-26 00:51:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,536
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20380972
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fierceawakening/pseuds/Fierceawakening
Summary: Not all of Gamora's memories of growing up in the Black Order are bad.Sometimes that makes things worse.





	Respite

**Author's Note:**

> This isn't a chapter of Children of Thanos because I want that to be entirely about the characters' pasts, and this isn't. So I'm posting it separately, but the characterizations of the Order members (especially the ones who get just enough screen time to threaten someone twice) come from that, as do bits of detail about their pasts. 
> 
> Which also, in some respects, means screw canon. They're a little less godawful to each other (and Thanos is a LITTLE less godawful to them) here than in the films.
> 
> If you're the sort of person who's cool with that, welcome. If you're the sort of person who takes that as a ringing endorsement of terrible people, please do both of us a favor and click that little left arrow at the top of your browser window. 
> 
> Thanks, and I hope you have a good day either way. :-)

The ceiling is wrong.

She tosses and turns. If she’d fallen asleep in Sanctuary, she might see the stars. But this isn’t an open space. This is a room, in a ship, and—and she thinks she knows it, but none of Father’s ships would have a ceiling painted that color, and if this isn’t one of the Order’s ships it must mean someone caught her.

A scream builds in her throat.

Instinct tells her not to let it out. Where is she? She feels soft sheets beneath and above her, and that means she’s not a captive. She settles for thrashing and snarling as quietly as she can.

“Gamora!”

The voice is familiar. More urgent than angry.

“Quill.”

“Gamora! Gamora, it’s me. It’s okay. It’s me.”

The voice is… annoying but soothing somehow. And whatever he’s doing, it isn’t a threat. She doesn’t move. He doesn’t either.

Until he does. He reaches to wrap his arms around her. She pushes them off, with little effort, and he gives her a look like a kicked Torblath pup.

She knows that look. “Peter.”

“Yeah,” he says, spinning his shoulder like she must have injured something. “Yeah.”

She curses. The first word that comes to her mind is in Titan, and hearing that language just makes her feel worse. She puts a hand to her head. “I mean, uh… ‘shit.’”

“Yeah, I gathered.” He winces and stretches.

She reaches for him. “Are you—?”

“I’m fine,” he says, still pouting like he’s not. He turns to look at her. “The operative question is whether you’re fine.”

“I am.”

“If you were, you wouldn’t be talking like that.” 

“I’m not talking like anything.” 

“Actually, you kinda are.” 

He reaches for her again. This time she lets him. It’s warm and soft and shouldn’t surprise her any more, but somehow it always does. She leans against him, and the tension drains from her frame. 

He puts his hand on top of her head, and she can’t tell whether he’s about to be tender or crack wise. She should care which—humans are terribly annoying, and whatever makes them that way, he seems to have an extra helping. 

Somehow, she doesn’t mind. His hand winds in her hair and she closes her eyes. 

But the dream isn’t gone. She opens her eyes to looks at the brightly painted walls and still sees angles and dark metal. “Peter.” 

“Mmm?” 

“Let go.” 

“What?” 

“Let go.” 

He glares at her. It’s about as threatening as the Torblath pup growling. “No.” 

“Peter—“ 

“I don’t care what that asshole did. You can tell me anything.” 

She sighs. _That isn’t the problem. I wouldn’t be saying this if it was._

“Hey. Babe.” He pouts. She cracks a thin little smile. “Whatever is bothering you, I’m here.” 

“I… I know that, Peter.” She touches his shoulder. It feels awkward, and she wishes she could just shove him away again. But that’s not who she is. Not any more. “It’s not about him.” 

His brows knit. “Bullshit. You only get like this when you’re dreaming about—“ 

“Home,” she finishes for him. 

He pulls back and blinks at her. “Now I know you haven’t come back yet.” 

“Not all my memories are bad, Peter.” 

He looks at her. “Babe. If anything is hell, it’s what you went through.” 

“My dream… it wasn’t about Thanos. It was about everyone else. About the Order.” 

“The other children Thanos stole? I thought you guys couldn’t stand each other.” 

She chuckles. “Fath—Thanos encouraged us to fight. To argue. To compete for his favor.” She closes her eyes, and her fists clench at the memory. “It made us angry. Bitter. Distrustful.” 

“He wanted you to hate each other.” 

She opens her hands again. “None of those things are hatred.” 

“What is that, an excuse?” 

“No.”

He lets out a low whistle. “There’s a word for someone who messes with people’s heads like that. I used it before. It’s 'asshole.'” 

She laughs again. “You’re not wrong.” 

“Then what’s a good memory look like?”

She pulls back to look at him. His brows knit, but he doesn’t look angry. Just sad, sad and confused, and somehow that makes the pit in her stomach deeper. _How could I possibly tell you?_

“He did care for us,” she says. _Does care for us, _she thinks, and that just makes it worse. She hangs her head. 

“The guy who’s willing to kill anyone.” 

“He thinks he’s being fair. He thinks… it doesn’t matter whether he cares for someone or not.” She closes her eyes again, remembering her father’s massive hand wrapped around her head. Remembering all the times he tried to keep the catch out of his voice, and she heard it there anyway. 

Arms wrap around her, too small to be his. 

“Peter.” 

“Hey.” 

She makes a show of opening her eyes and staring back at him. “Don’t worry. I’ll be fine.” 

He tilts his head and doesn’t say anything. 

“I… I’m sorry, Peter. I don’t… I want to explain it. But I don’t know how.” 

“You don’t have to.” He hugs her tighter. 

She sinks into his embrace again. Closes her eyes and sees only blackness. To someone else that might seem empty, but it means her mind is clear. Her lips twist into a grin. 

The dream will need facing eventually. But for now, she is content.

### 

It’s half a day before she thinks of it again.

That’s strange. She should be used to it by now, but she isn’t. These long stretches of time where everyone does nothing, says nothing. Thinks nothing, even, though she can’t believe she does that too until she wonders where the time went and realizes she can’t remember. “Relaxing,” Peter calls it, or sometimes “goofing off.”

She knows what relaxing is, of course, but until she left the Order it was rare. A few snatches of rest between training and missions. A few slow breaths between one horror and the next.

This is different. It lasts.

It calms her. But that brings the dream back to her mind. She was calm, that day. Almost like she is now.

She’s in her quarters, thankfully, and Quill isn’t. She left him on the bridge, arguing with Rocket and Drax about… something. She doesn’t even remember what, which means it’s not important. What is important is coming back here. Is lying down and thinking, somewhere she doesn’t have to explain.

She closes her eyes and lets herself remember.

###

They’re between purges, one of those times when the next prediction the model shows is a long jump away and there’s nothing to do but wait.

It usually makes things worse. There’s only so many times she can pull out her switchblade and spin it around until she calms down. And her siblings are the same. Quick with insults, fast and brutal in the sparring ring.

But this time is different. The waiting’s gone on so long her anger’s wearing off, and the other day in sparring Nebula managed to crack one of Cull’s ribs. He left everyone else with a nice set of bruises. Nothing too serious, but no one else is all that eager to rush back into the ring again, and Thanos hasn’t pressed the point.

Now she’s in one of the lounges, lying on a cot and poking at a bruise and thinking. The cot isn’t terribly comfortable, but now that she can close her eyes without her memories swallowing her up, doing nothing is… almost pleasant.

The door slides open and Cull stomps in. He plants himself on the other cot with the sort of wince that might look like a snarl if she didn’t know about his injury. Ebony Maw walks in after him.

_That’s not floating, so you’re both tired. _She smirks at them but doesn’t say anything. It’s not like she owns the rec rooms. The Maw nods back at her, apparently taking it as a greeting, and doesn’t sit down.

That’s apparently some sort of cue. Corvus wanders in shortly after. Concerned, Gamora guesses. Proxima follows him in because of course she does, and the two of them sit down on a wide stool, too close together.

Gamora huffs a little when Nebula shows up, but at least it means her sister isn’t off somewhere alone and brooding. Nebula glares at her, apparently on principle, and then turns to smirk at Cull instead.

He props himself up on one arm and glowers back at her. “You.”

She tilts her head and walks over to the cot he’s lying on. “Are you requesting a rematch so quickly?” She looks at his chest. “That is unwise.”

Gamora snickers, trying not to do it too loudly. _Nice._

“Hah!” Cull rumbles low in his throat. It sounds menacing enough, but he might just be covering another grunt of pain. “I’d tear half of you to scrap. Then what would the other half do?” 

Nebula’s eyes narrow and Gamora tenses. _Did you have to mention her metal parts? _She glances over at Ebony Maw, who’s frowning. Probably at Nebula. _But at least Saint Elder Sibling doesn’t want a brawl either._

Proxima and Corvus are leaning forward too, watching. Gamora rolls her eyes and slips a hand into her pocket for her switchblade. 

Nebula makes a little sound of her own. The stern set of her jaw relaxes and her eyes widen again. The corner of her lip turns up. “That would require you to catch me first.”

He bares his teeth at her. Then he laughs. “Fair enough.” 

Proxima grins, a little too widely. Gamora lets herself laugh too, remembers the knife she’s still holding, and spins it like all she meant to do was show off. 

Nebula nods to Cull, drags over a chair, and sits down. She doesn’t look graceful, not for Nebula anyway, and Gamora’s glad to see it. Ebony Maw is still looking at everyone, but even he looks a little less tense. 

“No one’s trying to kill each other,” says Corvus. “What now?” 

“You’re right.” Proxima bares her teeth. “This is boring.” 

Nebula shrugs. “I was amused.” 

“That’s because you got the better of that one.” Gamora retracts one blade of her knife and spins it so the one left extended points at Cull. 

“That’s not all.” Corvus says. “It’s been… quiet.” 

Gamora nods. It has.

“It’s not so bad,” Cull says, propping himself up on one of his arms. “Or it wasn’t until that one broke my ribs.”

“No, it’s not.” Gamora is surprised to hear herself say it, but it’s true. She’s slept well for the first time in weeks.

Nebula rolls her eyes at them, too blatantly to mean it.

No one says anything. Silence settles over them. Gamora takes a few deep breaths, like she’s supposed to when she’s meditating, and it feels almost… good?

It’s Corvus who breaks the silence. “So is this what things will be like when it’s done?”

Gamora blinks. Even Proxima is staring at him. “Done?”

“Don’t expect to live to see it done,” Ebony Maw says. Gamora looks at the ceiling so it won’t be too obvious she’s making a face.

“We all know that we will not,” says Nebula, sounding almost as annoyed as Gamora feels. “Thanos is a thousand years old, and the universe is vast. Even if our enemies do not kill us, we will die of old age long before—“

“Unless there’s some way to do it all at once,” Cull says.

Ebony Maw closes his eyes and laces his fingers.

_Are you thinking, or just getting ready to make a pronouncement?_

“There are ways,” he says.

Nebula’s eyes widen. Cold light flickers in them, which means she’s rifling through her databanks. She stares past everyone, looking at something only she can see. Her lip twitches once and she blinks. “He is right.”

“So we could live to see the end of this?” Proxima asks, leaning forward again. “All of us?”

“That is unlikely,” Ebony Maw says. He looks like he might say more, but Proxima interrupts him, grinning.

“Of course it is. The rest of you are idiots.”

_The rest of us? You’re the one who charges into battle ten seconds after we land. I’ll be surprised if you live to thirty._

“Unlikely isn’t impossible.” That’s Cull, laying back and looking up like he’s thinking. “And we all survived the purges on our home worlds.”

Gamora winces._ Did you have to bring that up? _But it looks like all it’s getting is a few frowns and not any drawn weapons. Which would make her the one starting something over it.

And as comfortable as the old anger feels, she’s not sure she wants to break… whatever this is going on between them. “All right, I’ll play along. What if we all live to see the end of this?”

Ebony Maw narrows his eyes at her. Which means she should probably stop talking. She’s been… less annoyed by him since he found her that night in the meditation room. But Proxima already made him look foolish, and there’s only so much he can do when everyone’s ignoring him.

“I mean, we just do this. Or spar or meditate or fly off on missions so we’re ready to do this. What if we… what if we didn’t have to do this anymore?”

“This is our purpose—“ Ebony Maw begins.

Gamora has just started rolling her eyes when Nebula, of all people, interrupts him. “Father will tend his gardens.”

Proxima snorts. “Shape the universe as you see fit, and the first thing you do to celebrate is grow plants?”

Ebony Maw floats out of his corner. A couple of his needles float around him, but he’s not aiming them at anyone. _Not yet, anyway_. “How dare you speak so disrespectfully—!”

Proxima stands up and laughs, cutting him off. “<_Oh, take the stick out of your ass, sibling!>_” she says. In Titan.

Gamora covers her mouth with her hand to make it less obvious she’s grinning. Father tried to keep them from learning to curse in his native language. Proxima made sure to figure it out anyway, and made sure everyone else learned as many curses as she did.

Right now she’s staring at the Maw, twirling some blades in her hands. But not attacking. _Yet. _“_<I wasn’t criticizing him. Just saying I would choose to do something less… mind-numbing.>”_

“He does prepare delicious soup,” Nebula says.

_Thank you, _Gamora mouths. She waits just long enough to make sure everyone’s distracted enough not to keep arguing and says, “The soup is good. But Proxima’s right. That would get boring. Much sooner for us than for Thanos.”

“We should at least conquer a galaxy,” Cull says, clenching a fist with an excited growl.

“Two!” Proxima roars right back at him, baring her teeth and laughing.

“You two do that, then,” Corvus says. “I can think of worse things than tending plants.”

Proxima whirls around to gape at him.

“For a while, at least,” he amends.

“What about you, Gamora?” Nebula says, looking at her. “You are the one who asked the question to begin with.”

Cull smirks. “Nah. She can go last.” He points at Ebony Maw. “It’s his turn.”

Ebony Maw shakes his head, just like Gamora expects him to, and moves his needles around like he’d rather do anything else.

Gamora shrugs. “What about you, Nebula? You said what Father would do, but not yourself.”

Proxima snorts. “She’ll just follow him. Or better said, trail after him like an unweaned Slaath kit.”

“Hey!” Gamora says, sitting up and reaching for her knife.

Nebula holds up a hand. “Perhaps you are right. Maybe I will help him to tend his garden. I will need something to do when I have slain all my enemies and you and Cull are still being chased through space by angry idiots.”

Gamora snickers and lowers her blade, but she doesn’t take her eyes off Proxima.

A voice cuts the silence, calm and even. “I would study.”

Gamora turns her head. Ebony Maw is still standing with his hands folded, and she’d doubt she’d heard him speak if everyone else wasn’t staring at him too.

“Study?” Nebula asks. “But you have millions of copies of texts here, from all across the universe, and have taught yourself from them.”

He nods. “Father has taught me. Or I have taught myself. All of my life. But I have never taken classes, or had my knowledge tested. Not by someone else.”

“And now… what? You wish to learn from other people?”

“Before Thanos came, when I was young, I hoped that someday I could travel to the city. That when I grew old enough, I would be accepted at one of the universities there.” He closes his eyes, apparently remembering. “Once… once the thing is done, I would like to do that. To see… to test my knowledge, and discover how much I have taught myself, and how much I need to learn.” 

Gamora blinks. _How much you need to learn? You taught yourself surgery from stolen textbooks._

Proxima scoffs. “Good luck finding a world where they don’t try to kill you on sight.” 

Cull rumbles a warning. 

“She means any of us,” Corvus says. “Not him personally. If we’re done, then there has been a purge on every world.” 

Proxima smirks. “That’s why we need to conquer them.”

Cull grins and makes a gesture with his hand that they all know by now means yes. 

“No,” says Nebula. “Not if Father is right.” 

_If._ That’s a strange way to say it. She’s not sure she likes the way it sounds in her head. 

Or how familiar it feels. She looks down at her knife and sets it on her fingertips to balance it. 

“Nebula's right,” she says after a long moment. “Father has told us that when he’s done—I mean really done, for good, and this thing is over—they’ll understand.” 

“That they will be grateful,” Ebony Maw agrees. 

“So if we live to see it, somehow—“

“Then any university would be happy to have you,” Cull says.

“Maybe,” Proxima grumbles. “But it’s Father who said it. How long will it take them to figure it out? Five hundred years?”

Corvus nods. “It might. The universe does contain a lot of fools.”

“Yeah. Five hundred years might not be much to Thanos. But—"

“It’s generations to us,” Nebula says, her voice soft.

Gamora sucks in a breath. It’s true the universe is thick with idiots. Sometimes it seems like all of them are trying to kill her. But she’s not sure stupidity is the problem. Not when her dreams haunt her even when she reminds herself there’s a reason for the things she’s doing. How much worse is it for someone who only hears it from Ebony Maw in the middle of a killing field?

She shakes her head. She can think about that later. This is nice. “Yeah, but it’s... it's just thinking. I’m asking what happens if everything goes right. I’m not saying it will.”

“Then what would you do, sibling?” It’s the Maw who’s asking it. She turns to look at him, surprised. “You are the only one who has not answered your own question.” 

“I’d go exploring.” 

“We have seen countless planets,” Nebula says. 

“Most of them are disappointments,” says Ebony Maw. 

“We’ve seen many different places, yes,” Gamora replies. “But either we were sneaking around on a mission, or their people met us in battle. As enemies. I…” She bites her lip, looking for words. “I’d like to see some of those worlds again. Once they know they don’t have to fight me.” 

Nebula looks at her without blinking. It’s a little unnerving. “I would like to do that also.” 

“I’m not stopping you,” Gamora says, looking past Nebula just to break the eye contact. “This isn’t one future per person.”

Proxima snorts.

“What?”

“She means she’d like to go with you,” Corvus says.

Gamora shakes her head. “She tries to kill me once a week.”

“I would cease,” Nebula says, “if I knew this future were possible for us.”

Gamora doesn’t reply.

“I am not lying.”

“…Fine. Why not? This whole hypothetical is crazy anyway.”

“Even if it is, exploring the universe sounds… pleasant,” Corvus says.

Gamora rolls her eyes. _You weren’t invited. _But she’s said it already: why not? They’re just making things up.

Proxima nods. She’s smiling. A little less maniacally than usual. “Even with you idiots.”

“Huh,” Cull says, a thoughtful little noise. He’s looking up at the ceiling and stretching, apparently trying to get comfortable. “I didn’t think we got along.”

Gamora looks at each of them in turn. They’re all bruised and they’re all tired, and most of them have turned away from each other. But Proxima’s still grinning, and Corvus looks happy enough sitting next to her. Cull is thinking. Nebula’s still looking back at Gamora, and Gamora’s not sure if she’s blinked, but she’s not sure she minds. Even Ebony Maw looks like he might crack a smile. 

“Maybe we do,” she says, wrapping a hand around the hilt of her knife and lying down again. “Maybe we do.” 


End file.
